With the launch of Season 4 of Daastan’s Stories Untold, Outcast Magazine, a South Asian queer-lit magazine founded by a Literary Fellow of Daastan, decided to hold an extension of the story writing competition to generate content and encourage stories in its own niche. Outcast Magazine worked to bring to light the presence of the LGBTQ+ community in the region of South Asia, and had had the honor of being endorsed by multiple internationally acclaimed platforms such as The CommonWealth Writers.
The Motive for Conducting the Competition:
We, at Daastan, recognized that abuse was an issue that transcended gender, religion, social, and traditional bounds, and so had its roots present in all kinds of society everywhere around the globe. Through this, both the team of Daastan and Outcast wanted to encourage stories of abuse to come forth from the LGBTQ community. The people who identified as any of these have, more often than not, been ostracized enough, and are at the brunt of many incidents of abuse that are enforced upon them as a way of punishment. The social stigma attached to such cases is even higher than the one attached to cases of child abuse, with people choosing to hush it up rather than talk about it so that the wrongdoers can be held responsible.
Your Response:
The magazine encouraged its writers to challenge the norms and break through the socially imposed boundary of remaining silent in the face of such evil, by raising their voice and penning down thoughtful, and inspiring work, between the word limit of 4000-6000. The competition received numerous entries from across the globe, and was a huge success. Being powered by Daastan, the finalists selected would be published in a print anthology, and the authors would receive a free copy of the published work. Along with this, they would also be awarded with a certificate and their names displayed on both the website as well as the Facebook page to help them gain publicity for their work.